Today Veterans for Peace UK and supporters held a vigil for Bradley Manning at the U.S. Embassy in London. Bradley begins a pre-trial hearing on Friday at Fort Meade, Maryland and faces charges that could lead to a lifetime in prison.

Michael Lyons spoke about how reading the Afghan War Logs had confirmed his doubts about the legality of the actions carried out by coalition forces in Afghanistan. In 2010 Michael applied for Conscientious Objector status refused to carry out rifle training in preparation for deployment to Afghanistan. He was sentenced to 7 months in military prison and was released in November 2011. Michael travelled up from Plymouth to show his support for Bradley Manning who faces a lifetime in prison.

Ben Griffin spoke about the importance of supporting war resisters. “If we are not actively engaged in war resistance then we should be offering our support to those that are. If it is true that Bradley Manning leaked The Afghan War Logs, The Iraq War Logs and the Collateral Murder video then the last place he should be is in prison. As far as I am concerned he is a Hero. Our countries have committed terrible crimes in Iraq and Afghanistan and it is only right that we should all know exactly what has been happening.”

An International day of action has been called for Saturday 17th December. See here for more information www.bradleymanning.org

A further vigil in London has been called by Veterans for Peace UK, London Catholic Worker, Payday and other supporters of Bradley Manning, for Saturday 17th of December, 1400hrs at the U.S. Embassy. Please join us. ”

” FREE BRADLEY MANNING ! END THE WARS !

Bradley Manning was born in the US on 17 December 1987 to a Welsh mother and American father. He lived in Wales for three years as a teenager. His Mum and other relatives still live in Wales. Having joined the US army in 2007 as an intelligence analyst, Bradley Manning was arrested in Iraq on suspicion of leaking classified information to WikiLeaks and had been detained for over 18 months by the start of his pre-trial hearing in December 2011. Bradley Manning was tortured in detention until moved to a less punitive regime in April 2011. The torture was extra-judicial punishment and very likely aimed (unsuccessfully) at persuading him to implicate Julian Assange of WikiLeaks in return for more favourable treatment.

Bradley Manning is accused of leaking the Collateral Murder video, footage which shows unarmed civilians being killed by US soldiers and which the US military had covered up. He is accused of leaking the Afghan War Diary, described by the New York Times as “an unvarnished and grim picture of the Afghan war”, and the award-winning Iraq War Logs that reveal human rights abuses by coalition and Iraqi forces. Bradley Manning is also accused of leaking hundreds of thousands of revealing and highly embarrassing diplomatic cables from US Embassies around the world. If convicted, he faces life imprisonment or even the death penalty.

Bradley Manning was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize in 2011 and topped a Guardian Readers’ poll for the prize with almost 40% of all votes cast. We call for Bradley Manning to be freed immediately and for all charges against him to be dropped. We call for an end to the persecution of whistle-blowers everywhere and for an end to silence and complicity at all levels as this is what makes large scale whistle-blowing necessary. Speak out against injustice!